Tree to 30 m tall. Forming a lignotuber. Ironbark on trunk and branches ca 5 cm diameter, thick, blackish, soft or hard. Juvenile growth (coppice or field seedlings to 50 cm): stems square and winged slightly; juvenile leaves always petiolate, opposite to about node 5 or 6, then alternate, ovate to broadly lanceolate, 4–9 cm long, 1.3–4.2 cm wide, bluish green to green, coppice appearing glossy. Adult leaves alternate, petiole 1.3–2.5 cm long; blade lanceolate to falcate, 7.5–17.5 cm long, 1.3–2.6 cm wide, base tapering to petiole, concolorous, dull, green, side-veins greater than 45° to midrib, dense to very densely reticulate, intramarginal vein parallel to and close to margin or remote from it, oil glands mostly intersectional or obscure. Inflorescence terminal compound, peduncles 0.3–2 cm long, buds 7 per umbel, pedicels 0.4–0.9 cm long. Mature buds ovoid to fusiform, 0.5–0.9 cm long, 0.3–0.5 cm wide, green to yellow, often with 4 longitudinal ribs, scar present, operculum conical, slightly narrower than hypanthium, stamens inflexed, with outer staminodes, anthers adnate, positioned obliquely at filament tip, cuboid, dehiscing by terminal pores, style long, stigma pin-head shaped, locules 3 or 4, the placentae each with 4 vertical ovule rows. Flowers white. Fruit pedicellate (pedicels 0.1–0.9 cm long), truncate-ovoid to obconical, relatively long and narrow, 0.5–1 cm long, 0.4–0.5 cm wide, slightly ribbed or angled longitudinally, disc descending, valves 3 or 4, enclosed. Seeds black or brown, 1.5–2 mm long, flattened-ovoid, often pointed at one end, dorsal surface shallowly pitted, hilum ventral. Cultivated seedlings (measured at ca node 10): cotyledons reniform; stems square or slightly winged in cross-section; leaves petiolate, opposite for 5 or 6 nodes then becoming alternate, ovate to lanceolate, 4–9 cm long, 1.5–4 cm wide, base tapering, apex to pointed, dull, green.
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